Cancer? Me?

CANCER. Yeah, I intended to caps-lock that bitch.

For me it was “well, ok, I have it – what next?”

For me it was “well, ok – let’s get rid of it”.

For me it was “well, ok – that’s over, what’s next?

Obviously there is a lot more intellectual and emotional stuff that happened between all that, but (again, for me), that is a pretty concise summary of how I handled it.

Mine happened to be Prostate Cancer, which if there was a shopping list of cancers to choose from, this one would be popular. Not much pain – a few weeks off work – and recovery rates are extremely high.

And then for me it was “well, ok, it’s over – what next?

Guess what – for me (again, it’s always about me) – work started to matter less. Things that used to be important; like being in the office by 7:30 AM and not caring how late I stayed, stopped being important.

What became important was time. Slowing down – being with friends and family – being with myself and allowing myself to relax, refresh, and just be around. Basically everything I totally sucked at doing before the cancer incident. So maybe it was a little wake up call – although I am still not very good at relaxing – I am trying harder (trying hard to relax is a huge contradiction).

Event Planning and Production is what I do. Work itself started to matter less, but learning to get better at what I do began to matter more. It now takes me longer to accomplish what I need to accomplish, but I am now slowing down and becoming more thorough. I think I might actually be developing into a better Events person as a result.

I am constantly reminded that you are not allowed to say you are cancer-free for five years after it has been diagnosed as gone. Big deal – lot’s of things could kill me in the next five years. It is no longer something for me to worry about, including cancer.

I feel extremely fortunate to have only dealt with a minor disease – I don’t think I would feel the same if I had to add chemotherapy and/or radiation to the mix. My heart goes out to those with cancers that are truly serious – mostly I have learned to be much more introspective, and I have learned that catheters blow. Many of these other unfortunates must learn how to die, and frequently very unpleasantly.

So for me (yeah I know, it’s all about me again) bye bye to cancer – time to un-caps-lock that bitch!

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